Partner quit his job to homeschool his autistic son

If child's mother is claiming the carers /dla, that implies the boy lives mostly with her. Does she have other children? Does she work full time?

What’s the set up, date s with mum days with dad? If dad is doing the lions share he should be in receipt of the benefits I’m in a similar position, I have a disabled son and home educate. Yes we get dla and carers but it’s hardly a full time wage and it’s tough but pays off if the child needs it of course. The only work that works for me is self employed from home as I can do an hour here and there, probably not more than two per day just to top us up (can earn up to 150 a week and receive carers on top)

See, this.

Did something change? I'm not sure why you thought you'd be ok having £40k a year less. Why did you think that would be ok?

This
Very few people I know could afford to give up work to home school

Hi Op
sorry you’re in this difficult situation!
maybe looking at things from a different perspective may help?
does your step son have an EHCP in place? This may help. If not, this may help with his return to education and his educational needs i.e 1to1 support, specialist equipment etc etc.
If he’s not going back into education, maybe look at portage to offer support.
by doing this, it might free up more time
for ur partner to work.
he could look at a working from home role when ur son is having support/ therapy.
even if your step son only attends a few hours a day, it would help x

So you’re missing at least 1500 a month, when you take into account DLA, Carers, and the UC top ups. Probably closer to 2k.

Extremely naive when the man has three children, not one. You are picking up the slack.

Ok this is the problem. If your dh has had to give up work, he is the carer and should be claiming the carers’ allowance. It would also give you a disabled child element and a carers element to your UC. So you’d be much better off.

What's your stepson's schedule? I.e. when is he at your house and when at his mum's house?

How on earth did you think you could drop 40k a year and not struggle? Did anyone actually sit down and look at the finances.

The agreement you had was that he would get a part time job, so he should honour that.

Why are you hesitating to raise your concerns with him?

All of the children are equally important. What does the drop in income mean for them?

If your stepson can't cope in mainstream school, sacrificing 'nice to have' things like holidays and expensive treats makes sense. An education is essential, lots of other things aren't.

But if you are struggling to provide nutritious food, keep a roof over their heads, or adequately clothe them, something has to change.

How old are the other kids? Is it a temporary struggle due to nursery fees and will be more manageable once they're a bit older?

Why didn’t the mum step in at all and home school too and they could have both dropped their hours.

quitting his job was ridiculous. It was very obvious your kids quality of life was going to be severely drop by this.

What a daft decision. How could you not see the problems .

Have you looked Dow the alternative provision route for your step son?

How is the homeschooling going?

How are your DC impacted by the financial shortfall?

How long since your DP has been employed?

I don't think you're being at all unreasonable to raise this. It's not unreasonable to be concerned that your DC are being affected in not being able to afford extra curricular clubs, or new school shoes etc. But you would be being unreasonable to have agreed to this and now be unhappy because you can't afford a pony.

So i think you'd be best to approach this with hard examples and clear ideas on how to rectify this. A budget you can show to demonstrate how this has impacted family finances and lifestyle.

Is the Mother paying maintenance? If not, why not ?

Is your husband right that you wouldn’t be better off if he found a job? Does he claim carers which exempts him from the need to look for a job on UC? Surely all your dc benefit from him being at home, not just the one who needs home education?

I personally think your dh is right to put his dc’s needs first. The damage done to neurodivergent dc in a school environment can be enormous, and also impact the entire family.

YABU
I've spend my ASD DS's entire childhood helping him massively
I don't work as a result
Absolutely necessary
But people think of me as lazy/pondlife for it

Yes this is absolutely it. I was one of those mums. It’s a heck of a sacrifice and now I’m hoping to work at an old age.

Lots of families with kids who have complex needs end up with one parent giving up or reducing work - usually the mum. It's a terrible indictment of how poorly we provide for children with SEN.

If your SS can't cope in school, what are the alternatives?

Would you be financially better off if he was working PT or not? Benefits are there to support struggling families. Your post doesn't make clear whether your objection is to having a reduced income or to your kids seeing their dad claiming benefits.

Is he the highest earner out of all of you? Seems illogical for him to be the one to stop work. When you looked at the sums before he did it, how did they look?

What is the plan for the son if he goes back to work?

Tbh withdrawing a child with additional needs without a rock solid plan is very short sighted, you're better in the system pushing the lea on their responsibility to provide a suitable education. Now he is out of school it will be much harder to get him back in somewhere decent

Yeah but you can claim a certain amount whilst working can’t you?

I couldn’t understand from the OP whether it meant she worked or not